Depends on the success because usually they will indeed run in limited amounts due to the pre-order way of working (there will probably be a time that we can't gather enough pre-orders anymore). However, if a deck becomes a huge success, we could keep on running them.

Thing is that we don't want to take any risks because it would make us lose a lot of money. Now everyone basically will just pay for the production of their decks and because it goes in pretty large amounts it is not super expensive.

Though I know your intentions are better than most companies, I just worry that with magiciansthegathering producing videos, having a tutorial service, and now decks, pretty soon it will just be another commercial magic site, intentionally or not

To be honest, that's what's also been bugging my mind; although Mark did give me some justification to settle me down, I forgot what it was... :S

It's okay if people start calling us commercial, but as soon as they call us "another commercial magic site" they don't really know what we are doing.

There are quite some factors that make a seller 'commercial', one of the most important ones being (overly) hyping products and trying to gain as many customers as possible for the sake of selling those products and making (a lot of) profit. This often includes getting on other websites in order to promote those products, and setting up affiliate and/or partner programs. We don't do any of this, for the reason we don't care a bit about the money. This is also why our very best/trademark effects are kept much more of a secret and underground (in a non-marketing kind of way).

Instead, we care about the art and try to do everything to make the art something special again, what it was supposed to be. We are 100% against free magic tutorials and public exposure, and we make extremely cheap exposure videos and tutorials so that people learn not everything is free or supposed to be free in this world. Also, we have our customers come to us instead that we go to them and we don't put anything down their throats. And we don't make actual trailers for our effects but make full performance videos instead, and we can make the prices of whatever we sell as low as possible, once again for the fact we don't care about the money.

That being said, yes, we will sell the playing cards in a much more commercial way, but 1) playing cards aren't magic and 2) most, if not all of the decks we will produce should make people realize that the way the art commercialized over the past years is absolutely ridiculous.

Take uncut sheets, for instance. You pay eight to fifteen times more for a deck which you cannot even use and if you start collecting them, you can't list them or hang all of them on your wall because they take too much space. Then to realize the decks were only produced half way through, uncut sheets are much cheaper to make than actual cut and boxed decks of playing cards. This is one of those odd, overly hyped, commercial things of the past few years.

So I hope that clears things up. Thank you for the concern though. ^_^

heh, i don't understand uncut sheets. Looking forward to the art fighters though.. will there be a preview picture soon?

The first sample decks came in! :D

Miracles 1st Editions from Germany are definitely da bomb (yet not very affordable since only five of those decks will be released on the market so I won't bother you with those in the rest of this post). Our Compass deck from the UK is great too, and Miracles 2nd Editions from the same company have been printed far too dark due to a misunderstanding, but this will be corrected and should be all fine soon. ;)

Although the cards are by no means USPCC'ish, they definitely have their pros and cons over USPCC cards. I think it is very worth adjusting your handlings to them or at least to practice as much with those cards as with your regular Bicycle cards. Faro shuffles may be a b*tch with them, just being very honest, yet palming has never felt this good before since these decks adjust much more to your hands than any other deck on the market. I guess that's a great thing, but in some cases it may be something to really get used to. ^_^

decks from germany! cool!^^

Awesome. I palm way more than I farrow, so that's a big plus for moi! :D

how good is the stock Mark? are they stiff? or are they soft? what about the finish? does it provide friction to the cards? or does it let the card smoothly flow?

just curious

Can I bathe with them, do they hurricane well, what sort of flavour are they and do they look good under ultra-violet?!! Can't wait to see 'em :p

We changed plans quite dramatically.

The Compass decks will be printed in the USA by the United States Playing Card Company and will be available for pre-orders soon. At the same time the Miracles 1st Editions (the expensive ones from Germany) will be released. Miracles 2nd Editions (the affordable ones) will probably be printed by the USPCC too, but those decks won't be available till sometime in 2012.

This means all decks do have USPCC quality and handlings, if not better in case of the 1st Edition Miracles. The Compass deck will be printed on Bicycle stock and will have Air-Cushion Finish.

The website should be up soon.

Wow cant wait to get some and play around with it :D

You must be the luckiest guy around too! People who live close to us can get a discount if they come pick up their orders. ^_^

Ha dat ga ik zeker doen lol .:p

You bet i do that lol.

It took a while but... the site is fully done and open for (pre-)orders!! :D
http://afpcc.com

Haha! That's brilliant Mark, I love the designs and everything on the "About" page

Ha nice Mark great job i really like the Miracles .

Pre-ordered mine!!!! OMG people start buying so it can be sold more quickly so I can get my decks!!! :mad:

Im not gonna order i gonna take them by myself by Mark if i know when he have the time :D

You will have to order nonetheless since these decks are pre-orders only (only shipping would be cheaper for you though). ;)